Ed RUSCHA (born in 1937)
1962 Annie
2020 SOLD for $ 23M by Christie's
New forms of pictorial art were developed in California around 1960 while pop art was born in New York. It is no coincidence that the works by Warhol and Lichtenstein were exhibited very early in Los Angeles. The innovations by Diebenkorn, Thiebaud and Ruscha also have a lasting effect.
Ed Ruscha began his career in commercial art. He was early influenced by Jasper Johns, whose rigorously symmetrical Targets put an end to one of the major taboos in painting. Johns dissociates art from its emotional and cultural contexts and emphasize difficult and complex textures. In addition Barnett Newman dared to use large monochrome flat areas outlined by perfect rectangles.
Ruscha perceives the key role of typography to attract public attention. The letters of the alphabet take for this reason the most varied forms, drawn for a specific need by anonymous artists. They can represent elegance in advertising images, thrill in comics. Ruscha had the fruitful idea to paint actual words instead of alignments of letters but their meaning no longer matters. In this nonsense and wit, Ruscha is also a follower of Duchamp.
In 1961 he visited Europe. Above the shops, the signs are composed in various appealing typographies. For the young artist who does not understand French, the beauty of these words is more important than their meaning.
He transforms the painting of signs into a new major art. In the center, a few letters constitute a word. The typography, the positioning, the monochrome color of the letters and the background allow an unlimited variety of visual impressions and of attempts at interpretation. Yet Ruscha does not propose a correlation with the raw meaning of his word.
From then on, Ruscha tirelessly positions words on more or less figurative images. This heterogeneous association has no meaning but it fascinates the viewer, as the assemblies of huge words by Christopher Wool will later do. Ruscha uses either single words that serve as slogans, or short sentences that include a contradiction, or movie titles.
Ruscha is in the right place at the right time : Los Angeles is eager for new art. In 1962 the Ferus Gallery exhibits the complete set of 32 Campbell's Soup Cans paintings by Andy Warhol, a young artist who also came from commercial art. Ferus is a short series of letters that have no meaning but sound good. In the same year this gallery organizes the first solo exhibition of Ed Ruscha, already recognized as the initiator of a new Californian form of Pop art.
In 1962 he appropriates the most recent typography of the title in the pages of Little Orphan Annie. The letters are easily recognizable : they are thick and contiguous in an undulating black outline, with minimized orifices, without forgetting the oblique oval dot over the i.
His use of the word Annie enlarges the typography from the comic strip without modification. The word painted in bright red, now isolated from its context, is placed like a title in a golden background rectangle, separated by a narrow white stripe from an empty rectangle of the same size with a blue background.
Such a geometrical rigor is the antithesis to Rothko : a new art is being born. Later the possible sources of the typographies used by Ruscha will no longer be directly reconciled.
That Annie, oil and graphite on canvas 181 x 170 cm, was sold for $ 23M by Christie's on July 10, 2020, lot 68.
Ed Ruscha began his career in commercial art. He was early influenced by Jasper Johns, whose rigorously symmetrical Targets put an end to one of the major taboos in painting. Johns dissociates art from its emotional and cultural contexts and emphasize difficult and complex textures. In addition Barnett Newman dared to use large monochrome flat areas outlined by perfect rectangles.
Ruscha perceives the key role of typography to attract public attention. The letters of the alphabet take for this reason the most varied forms, drawn for a specific need by anonymous artists. They can represent elegance in advertising images, thrill in comics. Ruscha had the fruitful idea to paint actual words instead of alignments of letters but their meaning no longer matters. In this nonsense and wit, Ruscha is also a follower of Duchamp.
In 1961 he visited Europe. Above the shops, the signs are composed in various appealing typographies. For the young artist who does not understand French, the beauty of these words is more important than their meaning.
He transforms the painting of signs into a new major art. In the center, a few letters constitute a word. The typography, the positioning, the monochrome color of the letters and the background allow an unlimited variety of visual impressions and of attempts at interpretation. Yet Ruscha does not propose a correlation with the raw meaning of his word.
From then on, Ruscha tirelessly positions words on more or less figurative images. This heterogeneous association has no meaning but it fascinates the viewer, as the assemblies of huge words by Christopher Wool will later do. Ruscha uses either single words that serve as slogans, or short sentences that include a contradiction, or movie titles.
Ruscha is in the right place at the right time : Los Angeles is eager for new art. In 1962 the Ferus Gallery exhibits the complete set of 32 Campbell's Soup Cans paintings by Andy Warhol, a young artist who also came from commercial art. Ferus is a short series of letters that have no meaning but sound good. In the same year this gallery organizes the first solo exhibition of Ed Ruscha, already recognized as the initiator of a new Californian form of Pop art.
In 1962 he appropriates the most recent typography of the title in the pages of Little Orphan Annie. The letters are easily recognizable : they are thick and contiguous in an undulating black outline, with minimized orifices, without forgetting the oblique oval dot over the i.
His use of the word Annie enlarges the typography from the comic strip without modification. The word painted in bright red, now isolated from its context, is placed like a title in a golden background rectangle, separated by a narrow white stripe from an empty rectangle of the same size with a blue background.
Such a geometrical rigor is the antithesis to Rothko : a new art is being born. Later the possible sources of the typographies used by Ruscha will no longer be directly reconciled.
That Annie, oil and graphite on canvas 181 x 170 cm, was sold for $ 23M by Christie's on July 10, 2020, lot 68.
1963 Smash
2014 SOLD for $ 30.4M by Christie's
SMASH, painted by Ruscha in 1963, offers its spectacular contrast between the five bright yellow letters in an elegant typography and the dark blue monochrome background, matching sun light with night ultramarine. The word is grounded on a slightly softer blue that provides an illusion of forth bursting. Its meaning is indeed pro-active.
The word SMASH is repeated in white in tiny size in the same typography on the lower edge and each side, adding an effect of framing.
This oil on canvas 182 x 170 cm was sold for $ 30.4M from a lower estimate of $ 15M by Christie's on November 12, 2014, lot 30.
The word SMASH is repeated in white in tiny size in the same typography on the lower edge and each side, adding an effect of framing.
This oil on canvas 182 x 170 cm was sold for $ 30.4M from a lower estimate of $ 15M by Christie's on November 12, 2014, lot 30.
1964 Hurting the Word Radio
2019 SOLD for $ 52M by Christie's
In two works painted in 1964, Ruscha shows the fragile and therefore ephemeral feature of his letters, which he attacks with metal clamps just as Warhol wounded his Campbell'scans with a can opener two years earlier. The wrinkling created by the tool reveals that the letter is a tissue or a paper that could not maintain its flat position.
One of them is BOSS. Two clamps crush the final S. This work is titled 'Not Only Securing The Letter But Damaging It As Well'.
The other one, oil on canvas 150 x 140 cm, is RADIO in yellow letters on a sky blue background, more exactly entitled 'Hurting The Word Radio # 1'. A clamp dislocates the O to bring it closer to the I. It is held in the Menil collection.
In the same format, Hurting The Word Radio # 2 is identical, except that an additional clamp painfully crushes the R at the point of its narrowing. This artwork was sold for $ 52M from a lower estimate of $ 30M by Christie's on November 13, 2019, lot 6 B.
One of them is BOSS. Two clamps crush the final S. This work is titled 'Not Only Securing The Letter But Damaging It As Well'.
The other one, oil on canvas 150 x 140 cm, is RADIO in yellow letters on a sky blue background, more exactly entitled 'Hurting The Word Radio # 1'. A clamp dislocates the O to bring it closer to the I. It is held in the Menil collection.
In the same format, Hurting The Word Radio # 2 is identical, except that an additional clamp painfully crushes the R at the point of its narrowing. This artwork was sold for $ 52M from a lower estimate of $ 30M by Christie's on November 13, 2019, lot 6 B.
1964 Securing the Last Letter
2023 SOLD for $ 39.4M by Sotheby's
Painted in 1961, an oil on canvas 183 x 170 cm reading BOSS is one of the earliest letter art by Ed Ruscha. It is kept at the Broad Museum at Los Angeles.
BOSS is reused in the same typography and floating arrangement in 1964 when the artist stages the interaction of his characters with clamps. The format is now 150 x 140 cm. The word is in bright orange on a midnight navy background.
Two versions of the 1964 BOSS were made, with descriptive titles of the drama. As for the RADIO of the same series, it is only the last letter which is attacked by metal clamps.
With two clamps attacking the final S, the work titled Not Only Securing The Letter But Damaging It As Well is kept at the Museum Brandhorst in Munich. With the softer action of a single clamp, Securing the Last Letter was sold for $ 39.4M by Sotheby's on November 8, 2023, lot 13 from the collection of the curator and collector Emily Fisher Landau who had been a close acquaintance to the artist.
BOSS is reused in the same typography and floating arrangement in 1964 when the artist stages the interaction of his characters with clamps. The format is now 150 x 140 cm. The word is in bright orange on a midnight navy background.
Two versions of the 1964 BOSS were made, with descriptive titles of the drama. As for the RADIO of the same series, it is only the last letter which is attacked by metal clamps.
With two clamps attacking the final S, the work titled Not Only Securing The Letter But Damaging It As Well is kept at the Museum Brandhorst in Munich. With the softer action of a single clamp, Securing the Last Letter was sold for $ 39.4M by Sotheby's on November 8, 2023, lot 13 from the collection of the curator and collector Emily Fisher Landau who had been a close acquaintance to the artist.
Gas Station
Intro
At the time of the birth of Pop Art around Leo Castelli, other artists including Wayne Thiebaud, Ed Ruscha, Frank Stella, managed to define and execute new artistic solutions.
Trained in lettering and advertising, Ruscha opted for the artist's book. His first book, edited in 1963, is a collection of 26 black and white photos of the serial gasoline stations on the road from his native Oklahoma to his beloved Los Angeles, viewed by him as "islands" in the flat Texas plains. In the next year his second black and white photobook mingles two themes in contradiction, small fires and a single image of a glass of milk. What is important is not a narration but the form.
From 1963 Ruscha transfers in paintings his geometric vision of one of the Standard Oil gasoline stations, located in Amarillo TX. The composition in a panoramic format is made around the straight line of the top of the building prolongated by the advertising panel of the brand. This dramatic perspective simulates the speed of a non stopping vehicle on the road. In 1962 the artist had painted a fancy ad for 20th Century Fox with the same mesmerizing diagonal.
Trained in lettering and advertising, Ruscha opted for the artist's book. His first book, edited in 1963, is a collection of 26 black and white photos of the serial gasoline stations on the road from his native Oklahoma to his beloved Los Angeles, viewed by him as "islands" in the flat Texas plains. In the next year his second black and white photobook mingles two themes in contradiction, small fires and a single image of a glass of milk. What is important is not a narration but the form.
From 1963 Ruscha transfers in paintings his geometric vision of one of the Standard Oil gasoline stations, located in Amarillo TX. The composition in a panoramic format is made around the straight line of the top of the building prolongated by the advertising panel of the brand. This dramatic perspective simulates the speed of a non stopping vehicle on the road. In 1962 the artist had painted a fancy ad for 20th Century Fox with the same mesmerizing diagonal.
1
1964 Standard Station / Ten Cent Western Being Torn in Half
2024 SOLD for $ 68M by Christie's
The first opus, executed in 1963 in large size, is located at Amarillo. It stages the station at night with three spotlights over the roof.
In the same size, the next is a day view in blue sky, titled Standard Station. The night illuminations are removed. At the upper right, proportionally at the place of a stamp on a postcard, a square figure illustrates the subtitle Ten cent Western Torn in half.
This oil on canvas 165 x 310 cm was sold for $ 68M by Christie's on November 19, 2024, lot 26A.
In the same size, the next is a day view in blue sky, titled Standard Station. The night illuminations are removed. At the upper right, proportionally at the place of a stamp on a postcard, a square figure illustrates the subtitle Ten cent Western Torn in half.
This oil on canvas 165 x 310 cm was sold for $ 68M by Christie's on November 19, 2024, lot 26A.
2
1968 Burning Gas Station
2023 SOLD for $ 22.3M by Christie's
The fifth and provisionally final opus is a night view of the station with a huge smoke canceling most of the row of the pumps. The fire threatens both the dazzling white building and the bright red panel with the STANDARD lettering, acting as a painted synthesis from the first two photobooks.
This oil on canvas 51 x 100 cm painted in 1968 was sold for $ 22.3M by Christie's on May 11, 2023, lot 20A.
The fourth opus, a night view, had mingled the same themes but with an unconvincing position of the flames coming horizontally out of the two floors of the building. The other three pictures had no burning. Ruscha confessed later that his burning station had been a reference to Magritte.
A sixth opus with complex sky colors was added in 1985-1986.
A night view with a huge Standard banner in each diagonal was edited in 1969 in 40 copies 65 x 102 cm. A trial proof was sold for $ 344K by Heritage on December 10, 2024, lot 65112.
This oil on canvas 51 x 100 cm painted in 1968 was sold for $ 22.3M by Christie's on May 11, 2023, lot 20A.
The fourth opus, a night view, had mingled the same themes but with an unconvincing position of the flames coming horizontally out of the two floors of the building. The other three pictures had no burning. Ruscha confessed later that his burning station had been a reference to Magritte.
A sixth opus with complex sky colors was added in 1985-1986.
A night view with a huge Standard banner in each diagonal was edited in 1969 in 40 copies 65 x 102 cm. A trial proof was sold for $ 344K by Heritage on December 10, 2024, lot 65112.
1967 Liquid Words
2021 SOLD for $ 20M by Christie's
Throughout his career, Ed Ruscha is an explorer of word based art, centered inside otherwise minimalist compositions. In 1966 he imagined featuring his words in a liquid condition, in the follow of the early surrealism of Magritte's folded eyes and Dali's melting watches. Ruscha revisits his Annie in a similar typography but eroded in semi liquid state, with the subtitle Poured from maple syrup.
Ruscha's series of words posed on a liquid surface is made of twelve paintings executed between 1966 and 1969.
An oil on canvas 150 x 140 cm executed in 1967 reads the word Ripe. It was sold for $ 20M by Christie's on November 11, 2021, lot 37C.
This opus is an alignment of these four letters. Their broad viscous lines are filled by a red material populated with pustules that could illustrate some psychedelic pop music. Its letter shape over the lemon yellow and green background is flat and frontal, despite a dripping below the p and the drop shaped dot of the i.
Mint (Green) is a liquid word executed by Ruscha in 1968. This oil on canvas 152 x 140 cm painted in 1968 was sold for $ 13M by Sotheby's on November 8, 2023, lot 21 in the sale of the Emily Fisher Landau collection.
Ruscha's series of words posed on a liquid surface is made of twelve paintings executed between 1966 and 1969.
An oil on canvas 150 x 140 cm executed in 1967 reads the word Ripe. It was sold for $ 20M by Christie's on November 11, 2021, lot 37C.
This opus is an alignment of these four letters. Their broad viscous lines are filled by a red material populated with pustules that could illustrate some psychedelic pop music. Its letter shape over the lemon yellow and green background is flat and frontal, despite a dripping below the p and the drop shaped dot of the i.
Mint (Green) is a liquid word executed by Ruscha in 1968. This oil on canvas 152 x 140 cm painted in 1968 was sold for $ 13M by Sotheby's on November 8, 2023, lot 21 in the sale of the Emily Fisher Landau collection.
1973 Truth
2024 SOLD for $ 14.8M by Christie's
In 1972 Ed Ruscha selects singular words that can have a moral appealing to the visitor : Mercy, Purity, Faith, Hope, Truth and an oblique Gospel, some of them in several versions.
TRUTH expresses the fear of a critical raise of falsehood in the modern world. In a 1973 example, the five bold italic capitals are aligned on a wide light orange horizon that separates throughout the width the volcanic brown and orange color fields. The color inside the letters is gradually amended from deep red to lemon yellow by the background over and under that horizon.
This oil on canvas 137 x 152 cm was sold for $ 14.8M from a lower estimate of $ 7M by Christie's on May 16, 2024, lot 12 B. A dedication to a dentist on the reverse stirs a comment by the artist related to the homophony between Truth and Tooth. Ruscha had executed a TOOTH in 1970 for the same collector.
TRUTH expresses the fear of a critical raise of falsehood in the modern world. In a 1973 example, the five bold italic capitals are aligned on a wide light orange horizon that separates throughout the width the volcanic brown and orange color fields. The color inside the letters is gradually amended from deep red to lemon yellow by the background over and under that horizon.
This oil on canvas 137 x 152 cm was sold for $ 14.8M from a lower estimate of $ 7M by Christie's on May 16, 2024, lot 12 B. A dedication to a dentist on the reverse stirs a comment by the artist related to the homophony between Truth and Tooth. Ruscha had executed a TOOTH in 1970 for the same collector.
1993 Cold Beer Beautiful Girls
2022 SOLD for $ 19M by Sotheby's
The signature letter art by Ed Ruscha is a new language in the follow of Pop art.
That minimalist style can express feelings and fun. Executed in 1993, the large scale COLD BEER BEAUTIFUL GIRLS brings a double word message of happiness in clean white block letters emerging from a nice background of blue sky loaded with dynamic white clouds underlined by a narrow land edge.
This acrylic on canvas 193 x 252 cm was sold for $ 19M by Sotheby's on May 19, 2022, lot 106.
It had been sold for $ 540K by Christie's on November, 2002, lot 39. The catalogue quoted Hamlet : Words without thoughts never to heaven go. Sotheby's 2022 catalogue reported a surrealist statement by the artist : Taking things out of context is a useful tool to an artist.
Another painting from the same period states that Irresistible Singles Win Incredible Dates.
That minimalist style can express feelings and fun. Executed in 1993, the large scale COLD BEER BEAUTIFUL GIRLS brings a double word message of happiness in clean white block letters emerging from a nice background of blue sky loaded with dynamic white clouds underlined by a narrow land edge.
This acrylic on canvas 193 x 252 cm was sold for $ 19M by Sotheby's on May 19, 2022, lot 106.
It had been sold for $ 540K by Christie's on November, 2002, lot 39. The catalogue quoted Hamlet : Words without thoughts never to heaven go. Sotheby's 2022 catalogue reported a surrealist statement by the artist : Taking things out of context is a useful tool to an artist.
Another painting from the same period states that Irresistible Singles Win Incredible Dates.
1999 Flag
2024 SOLD for $ 13.7M by Sotheby's
Jasper Johns had appreciated that the US flag does not need being accompanied by a comment.
Ed Ruscha follows in 1985. The folds of the blowing flag can support a study of depth on a flat surface. The first opus in the series features a flag under strong wind in a Western landscape with a cloudy light of sunrise or sunset.
The second opus, in the same year, features a blue sky. It adds a goodie. A text in four words is fully cancelled by corresponding heavy black stripes. The phrase behind could be the title of the work, an enigmatic Plenty Big Hotel Room. A subtitle is a dedication to the American Indian which cannot easily match the black stripes. In a surrealist vision the flag is floating away from its pole.
Plenty Big Hotel Room, oil on canvas 213 x 152 cm, was sold for $ 6.1M by Sotheby's on November 8, 2023, lot 16.
In 1999 the sixth and last of the series is a panoramic opus titled Georges' Flag, with a similar sunrise-sunset cloudy atmosphere as one of the examples above. This oil on canvas 96 x 330 cm was sold for $ 13.7M from a lower estimate of $ 8M by Sotheby's on November 20, 2024, lot 23. Please watch the short video shared by the auction house.
That Georges is the first owner through Gagosian : the Californian designer Georges Marciano.
Ed Ruscha follows in 1985. The folds of the blowing flag can support a study of depth on a flat surface. The first opus in the series features a flag under strong wind in a Western landscape with a cloudy light of sunrise or sunset.
The second opus, in the same year, features a blue sky. It adds a goodie. A text in four words is fully cancelled by corresponding heavy black stripes. The phrase behind could be the title of the work, an enigmatic Plenty Big Hotel Room. A subtitle is a dedication to the American Indian which cannot easily match the black stripes. In a surrealist vision the flag is floating away from its pole.
Plenty Big Hotel Room, oil on canvas 213 x 152 cm, was sold for $ 6.1M by Sotheby's on November 8, 2023, lot 16.
In 1999 the sixth and last of the series is a panoramic opus titled Georges' Flag, with a similar sunrise-sunset cloudy atmosphere as one of the examples above. This oil on canvas 96 x 330 cm was sold for $ 13.7M from a lower estimate of $ 8M by Sotheby's on November 20, 2024, lot 23. Please watch the short video shared by the auction house.
That Georges is the first owner through Gagosian : the Californian designer Georges Marciano.
